


Screaming

by melonkis



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Drugs, F/M, Insanity, Mind losing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:27:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25653625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melonkis/pseuds/melonkis
Summary: Molly Hooper wakes up in a reality that is entirely new for her. Her insanity and fugue are a punishment for Sherlock, designed by someone, who really likes experimenting on the emotional context in his life. Turns out that the mix of a broken mind and resurfacing memories can be really dangerous.
Relationships: Molly Hooper/Sherlock Holmes, Sherlock Holmes/Molly Hooper
Comments: 52
Kudos: 93





	1. I Can't

“Careful. It may be... difficult.”

 _Difficult_? Funny. You know what’s really difficult, you moron? Going through the stomach content of someone who just ate a half of McDonald’s. And I know what I’m talking about because I’m a pathologist. Wait... or I _was_ a pathologist? Can’t say. Everything seems so unreal.

Am I alive? Is the ceiling white or I just imagine it’s white? I hear voices, lots of them, but sometimes I think they’re just in my head. A face pops in the range of my eyesight once an hour. I know several of them. But most of my memories are blurry.

The last thing I remember? Christmas. But... I think I was younger then. Sixteen? Am I sixteen?

No, I’m a pathologist. I’ve studied medicine. Unless I am a genius, I can’t be sixteen right now.

“She’s been drugged with a LSD dosage so high it’s a miracle she breathes on her own. She should have been dead.”

That would explain a little.

“Any other damages?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Well, except for the effects of the overdose, of course. She’ll be fine in a couple of weeks. Physically, at least.”

There a two voices but I can sense a third person in the room. I know they’re out there but I can concentrate mostly on the ceiling.

“She may be in fugue.”

“How do they know? She’s bloody catatonic!”

Weasley? Was his name Weasley? No, that was from the book... the book I’ve read in high school.

“She’s catatonic because LSD racked up her mental stability. The doctor said she may never be herself again.”

What does it mean - _being yourself_? Seems to me like nothing. Where am I? Where is this _me persona_ everyone keeps talking about? Am I _me_ when I cut people of the slab? Is it _me_ wearing a new lipstick to impress a guy? I am perfectly sure I’m being myself right now. So... what _myself_ are they talking about? People tend to use meaningless phrases because they think it makes them sound so wise. And how can they know me at all? Are they my friends? Have they spent at least a minute of their valuable time to really get to know me? To find what my favourite cake is or what my morning routine is? How can anyone say they know anybody?

I’ve been drugged with the most dangerous narcotic there is. I am damaged beyond repair. I’m the best post-LSD traumatized person I can be.

“Why did she do it to her?” someone whispers.

“The same reason everyone does anything. Because she wanted to.”

I’m sure I flinched. But that must have happened in my head because they would notice. That voice makes me shiver inside. I feel heartbeat starting to race as fast as possible. It’s a good thing I lie down, otherwise my knees could have not keep me in a straight position.

That voice comes from the back of my head.

“I know, Sherlock, but even Eurus must have had an ulterior motive.”

 _Sherlock_. I want to gasp but my chest goes up and down calmly. What’s a _sherlock_ and why does it trigger a panic attack?

My eyeballs go from one side to another. There’s a dead silence in the room for a while and then I hear soft footsteps approaching the bed I lie on. I finally get to see a face: skinny, with sharp cheekbones, blue eyes and dark, curly hair. He stares at me intensively, seemingly looking for something on my own face - a sign of life, maybe.

“It’s a punishment,” he says.

Another person comes up; he has grey hair, wears a suit. Looks like a police officer. I notice a badge clipped to his belt.

“A punish-“

“She’s lost her mind,” the first man cuts in before the second can finish the sentence. “She’s denied most of her memories. Her brain is permanently damaged. No one really knows how much she remembers. And from the movement of her eyeballs I’m guessing she doesn’t recognise me. None of us, to be exact.”

Another man comes up; he also has grey hair but is visibly shorter than the two. He looks really worried, keeps glancing at the tallest, the curly one. He gazes at me, studying my face very thoroughly. What does he expect to find?

“And it means-“

“She doesn’t love me,” the dark one replies to the shortest. “It means the only person who loved me unconditionally is dead without being really dead and I’m forced to look in her empty eyes, knowing I am no one to her.”

They all fall silent. _Love him?_ He is, of course, quite handsome, but to love him? He seems arrogant, the way he keeps cutting in everyone’s sentences. 

“And this is the punishment?”

“Yes. The punishment for all the years of pain I’ve caused her. Now I’m the one who said ‘I love you’ and will get nothing in return.”

_I love you._

A memory flashes to my head. This voice haunts my brain. I’m sure I’ve heard it before but it seems to be hidden behind a thick wall. I look at him but his face remains cold. I try to ask him what does it all mean, does _he_ love me now? I’m lost in this conversation.

 _Will get nothing in return_.

The two other leave the room. He leans over and places a kiss on my forehead. He flashes me last sad and coldly furious look and shuts the door behind him. I see a slide show: the morgue, the lab, the thoroughly packed little present, the man falling behind the window.

I want to scream but I can’t.


	2. I Try

The curly-headed one has established a new routine. He comes once a week to visit. That’s new.

I don’t get many visitors here. There are nurses, who enter my room three times a day, forcing me to take meds. Well, I’m not the one to give in easily, so they have to put a lot of effort to make me swallow the pills and I don’t do it myself anyway. I look like a dog or a cat - they massage my throat until they’re sure the meds go down to the stomach. I feel sorry for them, but it’s not like I can do much more. My body is detached from my brain.

There’s also a doctor - Mark... _something_. I didn’t get his last name and didn’t care to ask. He comes by once a day to tell me what the weather’s like, how my blood tests came out and remind me how important it is to eat solid food. _They can’t keep me on the IVs for much longer_ , he says. He mentioned something about me losing a lot of weight. I have to believe him because I don’t recognise my body entirely. He talks to me as if I didn’t know anything. Let me tell you something, _mister_ \- I may look like a vegetable but my brain is fine (excluding the major damages caused by LSD, of course). I know I’m in a hospital for the mental ones. I’m not stupid.

The doctor’s visits seem pointless. He looks at my patient chart, takes my temperature, checks my reactions. If the diagnosis were based on them, I would be out in no time. But it’s not. His visits are not _completely_ useless, though. I managed to overlook the chart and confirmed the name once: _Molly Hooper_. It reminded me of a certain badge and a white coat. These were the memories from the morgue and lab. But I couldn’t see any faces, they were blurred. I remember the rooms, especially the lab. Nothing beyond. Still, it was better than nothing at all.

The curly-headed one comes once a week and sits down almost at the other end of the room, in the left corner. He always wears a suit but he doesn’t look like the police officer that came with him the other day. I can’t figure out what he does for living. He takes off his coat and scarf, and sits in _his_ corner. He puts his hands like in a prayer and presses them against his lips.

And stares.

 _Endlessly_.

Not once in six weeks he’s spoken to me.

His bright blue eyes study my face and my eyes follow his. I don’t take them off of him. I usually sit with my legs pulled up and pressed against my chest, with arms wrapped around my knees. He sits in the corner for about an hour. He doesn’t take notes, doesn’t look away. Doesn’t take a short round around the room to straighten up his legs. It’s a routine and it’s quite comforting to know what he’s going to do every time he drops by.

Then, after the hour is over, the puts on his scarf and coat, comes close to me. He places a kiss on my forehead and whispers something that sounds like “Norbury”.

But after those six weeks I notice a change. During the seventh week, I _wait_. I keep glancing at the clock over the door on Wednesday. He doesn’t have one specific hour we comes at but the later it gets, the more anxious I am. Not that anyone could tell - my body is still resilient to all brain commands. It’s heavy, like a medieval armour.

It’s almost nine in the evening when he walks in. I have no idea why he’s been let in at such a late hour, but he does come in. He looks pale and exhausted. His movements are slower than usual. There are dark circles around his eyes. He flops onto the chair and doesn’t look at me intensively anymore. He supports his head with the thumb and the index finger of his right hand and blinks but there are no more thinking traces in his eyes. He moves his eyelids up and down and they’re heavy from something that resembles pain.

He sits like this for about twenty minutes and then he pulls up his chair right at the end of my bed. He stares straight at me at the very close proximity of two feet.

I don’t have the slightest idea of what my face is showing but I know I feel frightened.

I understand what happened to me, I know the side effects of LSD. And I know that it wasn’t my weekly guest who drugged me - it was a girl named _Eurus_. Since he looks like a male, I don’t have any reason to believe he’s the perpetrator, but if I didn’t know any better, I would suspect it because the guilt filling his eyes is so heavy I wonder how he can walk without limping. But now, being close to him, I can feel the warmth of his breath. It’s fresh, very minty at the end of every exhale. My heart pounds pretty quickly comparing to last seven weeks but I still don’t move much. I feel trapped.

I try to tell him it’s not his fault. I really do. I can see he puts all the blame on himself and I would like to tell him to forget it. I don’t remember him anyway. He should find someone else and fall in love again (I hate those so called _advices_ but they seem to work for some people, and I hope they would for him), maybe this time with someone less mental. He’s very handsome; I’m sure he won’t have a problem finding someone willing to take the pain away. He also seems very intelligent and perceptive. That’s always very attractive.

He looks at me for another thirty minutes and stands up unexpectedly. He locks my face in his hands and kisses my forehead, but then, he puts our foreheads together. I raise my eyes up to see his face and it’s all wrinkled with pain. He closes his eyelids very tightly.

“I’m so sorry, Molly,” he whispers and it almost sounds like crying. “Please, forgive me. Please. Please. Don’t hate me.”

I want to comfort him that I don’t even know him and therefore cannot hate him. It’s this Eurus gal. She’s nuts, not him. Maybe _she_ hates him? I don’t understand why _I_ would do it. Unless he was my bodyguard, he’s not the one to blame. And even if he were, it wouldn’t be his fault. _He’s not the perpetrator._

The minute he straightens, one of the grey-haired visitors walks in. It’s the shortest one. He looks at the curly-headed, worried. He, however, steps back quickly.

“Sherlock, we should go.”

 _Sherlock_. I come to realise that it must be his name. Sounds dramatic. Baroque. Funny even.

“I know. Thank you, John.”

I follow him with my eyes to the exit. He walks out without looking back.

I lie down on my bed and cover myself with a blanket. Although my brain has issues adjusting to the new reality it’s found itself in, my sleeping schedule is quite regular and looks good; I fall asleep around eleven, wake up at seven. My dreams are very basic - they are a mix of the hospital staff’s faces and childhood memories. My dad often comes to me and plays with me and my sister. I know he’s dead. I remember that much. It fills me with sadness. I have this one memory; our dad was always cheerful, even after he was diagnosed with cancer. But I caught him sitting alone in the bedroom once, going through our old family photos. I was quite certain he was crying. Being twelve back then, I had no idea what to do, how to help him, so I got back to my sister. Our dad came back to play with us five minutes later and he was cheerful again. If I hadn’t seen him earlier, I could never have told he was in pain.

Then, after I wake up, the nurses change my IVs, force me into taking meds, I sit. They try to feed me with solid food, like toasts for breakfast and pasta for dinner. I cannot make my body move towards the plates. I promise myself that I will try to force my muscles everyday to make a progress and maybe finally reach the food. I have to, if I want to survive.

But _do I_?

Do I want to return to the life I don’t know? Do I want to be out of the hospital, in the real world? Out of the warm comfort zone of my bed? Amongst the people I don’t recognise? All I have is the memories, more even like shreds of them. A man falling behind the window. A present? And the word: _you_. I don’t even know that it means.

The memories from the last visit of the unknown trio are without any faces again. They trigger my anxiety, so when I try to go through them again, I do it very carefully. I don’t know why it’s so difficult for me but I feel like there’s a huge weight to them. Maybe back then I felt emotionally attached to all those events? I can’t exclude any possibility. But the man... Have I witnessed a suicide? That would explain the fright.

And the curly-headed one. _Sherlock_. He’s handsome. But why would a man so attractive come to my hospital bed every week? He said something about love but if he does love me, I won’t be able to tell. His visits are not romantic. He doesn’t try to convince me to talk. He just sits there and stares. Maybe he tries to find a solution? Truth is, I start to like his presence. He’s arrogant but I feel like there are whole entire worlds to see under this obnoxious shell. I wish I could tell him about my thoughts, but my body does not cooperate.

I fall asleep to a voice echoing _I love you_ in my head.

* * *

“...she’s definitely in dissociative fugue. It means that she blocks all the traumatic memories, or even more. Her memory can spontaneously get back entirely one day, or piece by piece... or never. Seeing you, all of you, can help but it’s no guarantee. Just talk to her but don’t force her into remembering anything. Use phrases she can remember, show photos of places she’s been to. But not too often and not too forcibly. It can get worse.”

The door to my room creaks when it’s being opened and the Three Horsemen of Madness come in. Not one of them looks happy to be here. I can sense their awkwardness. I imagine talking to me must be as weird as talking to a wall. The result is pretty much the same. _Sherlock_ and the police officer sit, the short one, _John_ , stands. They all keep a distance, as if afraid of my sudden attack. Considering my body does not belong to me anymore, there’s no threat.

“Hello, Molly,” _John_ says finally. “I’m sure you have troubles remembering us... but we’re here to help you. My name is doctor John Watson. This is detective inspector Greg Lestrade and this is... Sherlock Holmes.”

This is the part where a normal person would respond but as it happens, I’m no longer considered normal. It has its perks, you know. My gaze jumps from one person to another. _Detective inspector_ has a wrinkle of worry between his eyebrows and looks hurt. _Doctor Watson_ anticipates some sort of feedback from me, apparently. _Sherlock Holmes_ studies my eyes thoroughly again.

They all should be locked down here with me, to be honest.

“Sherlock and I are sort of... detectives,” says John.

Three detectives in my room. Am I a forensic pathologist? No, I remember St. Bartholomew’s hospital. I once met a guy named Jim there, who turned out to be gay. But someone had warned me about this before...

I see shreds of the lab. I feel dizzy and blink intensively, while John continues his monologue.

“...and you used to help us. You know, we could really trust you.”

_...and I’ve always trusted..._

“Molly.” Sherlock’s voice does it again to me - makes my heart race. I blink quickly. “We’d like to discuss a case with you. It’s very easy, I’ve found the resolution in about three minutes.” _Ugh, cocky_. “But that’s why we’d like to start with something very simple.”

He looks at Greg.

“Well, the victim was found naked in his own home, with only watch on his left hand,” says Lestrade. “The watch wasn’t working, it showed eleven thirty. It was male, thirty four, worked as a...”

“No, you’re doing it wrong,” Sherlock interjected. “You’re telling the story from the wrong point of view. How is she supposed to understand a word of what you say if you tell the story, starting from the middle?”

The cockiness again. Something in my body wakes up. I begin to feel a strange heat somewhere in my chest area. I’m close to rolling my eyes on him.

“Sherlock, I think _it is_ the beginning,” John argues. “This is how the story begins for us.”

“Oh, come on, John, not you too!” Sherlock replies, annoyance visible on his face. “I understand that being an idiot must be difficult but it doesn’t excuse you from thinking at all.”

_What?_

John only rolls his eyes ( _finally_ , someone!). The argument gets hotter with every minute and Sherlock doesn’t slow down with the insults. I don’t like it. It’s getting on my nerves. “Idiots”, “morons”, “half-brainiacs”, “thinking requires a brain”. These phrases slip out of his mouth uncontrollably. I see now he’s the emotional one in this trio. John and Greg try to convince him to calm down but he’s on fire. He cannot be stopped.

“...and I’ve told you, the watch has been tampered with! Oh, his bloody fiancé set the time as a symbol of the number of days spent together. Until she’d found out about the lover, of course. A three-year-old could resolve this! Seriously, Lestrade, I’m starting to consider that they choose ONLY MORONS to be police officers...”

Before I can restrain myself, I hear my own voice:

“STOP IT!”

I feel like I’m outside my own body. I watch myself from a perspective of a third person. The room falls silent. I observe three pairs of eyes getting wide to the size of tennis balls. Sherlock’s sarcastic look on his face fades into fear.

Every vein in my body pulses furiously. The heat takes over my numb muscles. My face burns. The bones in my jaw almost hurt, when I say the words:

“JUST _STOP IT_!”

Suddenly I stand on my bed but not for long. I take a long leap and jump on Sherlock, pinning him to the floor.

Once again I’m in no control of my body. Something in my brain tells me to stop but my fingers wrap tightly around his neck without my consent. I’m out of control but this time, I can’t stop my body from moving, not from sitting still. He’s slim but strong and I’m certain he’s able to defend himself, especially with my arms so skinny and bones so frail. I don’t know if it’s the shock or the lack of strength, but he doesn’t do much to push me.

I feel John’s and Greg’s hands trying to pull me away, but my fury is stronger. My palms clench even tighter around Sherlock’s neck.

“Molly!”

 _I’m not Molly_. I’m not the one they’d like me to be. _Molly Hooper doesn’t exist anymore_.

I look straight in Sherlock’s eyes. They’re bright blue, filled with tears. He seems to be begging me, but not to stop. _Forgiveness_. It feels like a _sorry_. And not even for getting me mad. I don’t understand. For a second I think I let go a bit of the clench.

 _You_. I’ve seen those eyes before.

Dizzy. World spins. I tighten up my grip.

“NURSE!”

A few second later I hear the door creaking again. Several footstep approach me. They pull me back by my arms and shoulders, I fight it. I notice three nurses and a doctor. He holds a syringe in his hand.

“STOP IT!”

It sounds like crying. I shake, try to bite, kick everything and everyone. I toss and turn, and I’m not even in my bed anymore. My body is detached from my brain. Still. I want to be calm but I can’t. Everything in me says to be furious, so I am.

“ _STOP IT!_ ”

My scream is so loud it makes my guests wince. The nurses and the doctor manage to hold me in their arms for five seconds. Sherlock slowly sits on the floor. I feel a sting in my arm, which makes me only scream more. Whatever is in that syringe, it starts working immediately. Sherlock’s frightened face gets blurry. Suddenly, I find myself lying on the floor.

“Leave me alone,” I mumble.

I see a colourful sweater, a kitchen and a telephone in my hand. Before I’m able to take a closer look, I drift away into a black emptiness.


	3. I Do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments and kudos! ❤️ You, people, made my day. Every opinion matters for me.  
> I hope you'll like it. :) There's only one more to go!

“Molly, I’d like you to talk to me.”

And I’d like to be not-post-LSD traumatised. We all want something, don’t we, Mark?

I flash him an irritated look. He was the one who stabbed me with the freaking syringe two weeks ago. I’m still not over it. He surely thinks he did the right thing but I beg to differ. Although... well, it looked like I _was_ capable of killing Sherlock Holmes, who, apparently, is a London celebrity.

Since I’ve opened my mouth (only to scream, but who cares, right?), they bring me newspapers here. It’s nice to get my hands and brain busy but I’m sure they have an ulterior motive for this. Like, I don’t know, a topic for a conversation?

“I know you can do it.”

I sit with my legs pulled up again. I want to hide in the tight space between my thighs and my chest, so I place my forehead against my knees and let out a sigh.

I’ve made it easier for them. Apparently, the connection between my brain and my body has been restored. I swallow my meds all by myself. I eat more. I especially love toasts for breakfast. Sometimes it takes me two hours to chew out two, but I make myself do it because I want this nightmare to be over.

I really start feeling it - the heaviness of my damages. I’ve come to the realisation that I am truly alone and have no idea about myself. I know only a couple of things: my name, my sister’s name and address, my own address, my workplace. My scientific knowledge is intact, so that’s a relief. But I don’t remember who I was for the last seven years (at least!). I don’t know who to trust, who to refer as a friend. I am really lost. I don’t remember feeling so lost ever in my life. I’m like a time traveller - I’m suddenly moved from one place to another and no one gave me an instruction manual. I suspect the Three Horseman of Madness used to be my friends. Though, I can’t help but wonder - _how come_ did I manage to make friends with _detectives_?

And there’s still the matter of Sherlock himself. I can’t figure him out. He said, he clearly said _he was now the one who’d said ‘I love you’ and would get nothing in return_. Does it mean he _wants_ to receive something in return? And does saying ‘I love you’ equal loving someone for real? What were the circumstances? And have I said it first?

The number of mysteries here is too much for me.

I’ve gathered more pieces of my memory puzzle. When the content of the syringe begun to work, I remembered myself standing in a kitchen, wearing a colourful sweater, holding a phone in my hand. Every time I try to retrieve more, a wave of anxiety forces me to back out.

“Molly, you’ve managed to break the catatonic state,” the doctor resumed. “Please, don’t let it go to waste.”

I roll my eyes at him.

“Fine,” I reply.

Mark’s eyebrows go way up as he smiles and almost chuckles at the sound of my voice. I sound a bit hoarse. Last time I ‘spoke’, I screamed like in a torture seat. But they must definitely change my meds. They make me feel numb and sleepy but I assume it’s way too soon for such a request.

“What would you like to know?” I ask.

“Well... how are you feeling today?”

I sigh in exasperation.

“Seriously, Mark?”

He shrugs.

“You know what they say - if you want to know how someone feels, ask them.”

I rub my eyes before I respond.

“Sleepy and lazy. These sweeties do much more damage to my brain than LSD has done.” I point at the pills in a small plastic cup on my nightstand.

“If you don’t feel good, we’ll think about finding something better.”

“Thanks.”

We both fall silent. A guilt manages to resurface over the fog of numbness. I look at my palms. They’re normal. My fingers are appallingly bony but they look all right. No injuries. I think about the moment when they were tightly clenched around his neck. I was so close. I would kill him, no doubt.

I thank doctor Mark in my mind. He would be right to say he did the right thing.

“What... wh-what...” I stammer, my breath getting shallow and irregular. “What- what about-“

“He’s all right,” doctor Mark answers, smiling gently. “No permanent damage. A bruise on the neck and bloodshot eyes for a week. I’m convinced he looks good as new now.”

My fingers around his pale neck. His eyes filled with sorrow and guilt. He tried to say _sorry_.

I try to even out my breath but I fail. Tears burst out of my eyes and I utter a sound that resembles a howl. I press my hand clenched into fist against my forehead. My crying is so intense something inside me cramps and hurts. I catch every breath with a great effort, greedily but barely successful. I feel shrunken. I notice there’s a stream of drool coming out of my mouth. I let it soak up in the sheet.

This is how broken I am. This is how broken I’ll always be.

Broken beyond repair.

“I didn’t want to...” I shriek, rocking a little bit forwards and backwards. “I don’t know...”

“I know you didn’t want to hurt him, Molly,” says the doctor calmly. “You were disoriented.”

_Disoriented?_

“I’m not fucking disoriented!” I yell, looking at him. I don’t see him too well, my vision is blurry from the tears. I wipe my mouth into my arm. “I am messed up! Hell, I’m _fucked_ up! And this-“ I point my finger at my temple, “This is now fucking useless. If I killed myself, no one would care.”

I let out a sigh. Inhale, exhale. I try to stop the increasing frustration. The tears stop falling down my face. My heart slows down. My breathing finds its rhythm.

“Did you think about killing yourself?”

I shrug, avoiding his eyes.

“No,” I reply sincerely. “But I wouldn’t mind if I died.”

Doctor Mark remains quiet. He stands next to my bed, holding my patient chart and observes as I slowly pull myself together. _So this is what’s been hiding behind this catatonia?_ , I think, analysing my behaviour in last two weeks.

“You’re wrong,” he says eventually. “There is one person who would bring hell on this world if you died.”

I look up at him. He smiles.

“Don’t worry. It’ll come to you.”

He walks out of the room, leaving me clueless.

* * *

My reading is being interrupted by a shut of the door in my room. I raise my head up to see him glued to the wall as if he played a spy. He pants heavily and looks at me suspiciously. I frown.

“Erm... hello?”

His body relaxes and he bounces off the wall, slowly striding closer to my bed.

“Hello, Molly Hooper.”

I watch him carefully but it’s difficult since my heart pumps my blood so loudly I can barely hear my thoughts. Not that I have a lot of them. The drugs take care of that. He goes around the bed and stops at my left side. He looks down at me with a sincere interest.

There is a barely visible remain of a bruising (the author being me) on his neck. His eyes look perfectly white, his (lovely) curls don’t seem so floppy. He grins, which, I suppose, is a bit unusual of him, since this is the first time I see him smiling and he’s been visiting me for about two months. Well, excluding the last three weeks. He wears one of his suits with a plum shirt. He looks _good_. I have to swallow hard to distract myself from the thoughts which begin to cloud my judgment. I pretend to be interested in my book again.

“How did they let you in?” I ask flippantly.

“I’m not exactly following orders by being here,” he replies.

I look up at him.

“What do you mean?”

His gaze freaks me out but I manage not to flinch.

“I’m not allowed to be with you alone. Apparently, you’re a danger to me.”

I put away the book and stand on my bed. We’re face to face. Our heights are equal now and the distance between us is not bigger than ten inches.

“Are you afraid of me?” I ask and I start noticing I’m unable to refuse the urge of looking at him.

“No,” he responds. “Unpredictability is my forte.”

We gaze at each other for a while and the moment’s suddenly gone. But I could swear I saw a spark in his eyes - a spark ready to light a fire.

“What are you doing here, then?” I ask, crossing my arms on my chest.

“I came here to see you,” he replies, following my every move. “I heard the good news about you breaking the catatonia, so I thought it would be a wise idea to talk to you, now that you _do_ talk.”

“You do realise that you’ve made me angry enough to wake me up, right?”

He smirks and I don’t like it. I mean... I like it, but I don’t. I have a bad feeling about this.

“I’m well aware of the fact, yes. Mainly because I’ve done it on purpose.”

My eyes widen and the urge of choking him again suddenly doesn’t feel so distant.

“WHAT?!”

He hushes me, looking at the door behind me.

“Oh, come on, we’re in a lunatics’ house. Talking to oneself isn’t unusual.”

He chuckles, visibly beaming. _Did I just... make him laugh?_ , I think watching his face wrinkle in a pure happiness. I almost forget I was mad at him. _Almost_.

“So?”

“I’ve been observing your eye movements and microexpressions for weeks. You’ve been slowly opening and I knew you needed a trigger. And I know what triggers you easily, so...”

I think about the time we must have spent together. How well does he know me? Apparently, very well. Papers write a lot about his observing skills and deduction, so I assume he doesn’t need much to get to know somebody. I flash him a smile.

“Thank you.”

Instead of returning the gesture, he does something completely different. His cheerful mood fades away as he locks, almost stubbornly, his eyes with mine. I can count his eyelashes and see every speck in his blue irises. His pupils are wildly dilated. I’m close to forgetting about breathing.

He glances at my lips every now and then.

He leans forward a little bit but backs out in a second. My heart races so fast I’m sure it doesn’t go less than two hundreds beats per minute. And trust me, it’s _a lot_.

“So...” I whisper, not letting go of the gaze even for a microsecond. “What was the nature of our relationship before?”

“Not sexual,” he replies quickly.

I open my lips a little bit more.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.” His voice is weak.

Something new and forgotten wakes up in my body. I feel a pleasant tingling in my lower back and a heat radiating from his skin. My hands are surprisingly hot as I move one of them upwards the left side of his chest. He glances at my palm but gets back to my eyes immediately. My head is so loud with wild visions.

I surrender to the urge and lock my lips with his. They’re soft and it feels like I haven’t done this in ages. He’s tense, not a muscle in his body moves. I throw my hands around his neck but his hands are stiff. I feel like an assailant. I don’t want to force him into anything but he definitely returns the kisses. It looks like he restrains himself.

I tangle my fingers into his dark curls. He closes his eyes a bit tighter and exhales softly. He definitely represses his emotions.

“Oh, come on, just give in already.”

He’s still tense for another three seconds and he finally gives up. His hands land on my waist. His embrace tightens and his mouth opens wider. He lets out a soft moan when one of my legs clenches around his hip. His touch wanders across my back, my hair, my face. He grabs my buttocks and lifts me up, so I can clench the second leg around him. When I feel his hands on my bottom, I utter a pretty loud groan. I am out of control of my body again but this time it’s different. I feel the pleasure of being taken over by it and I voluntarily surrender. I let the heat control me. I like the wild person I am right now.

His kisses slide down on my neck and turns dangerously further, into my neckline. I lean back my head, savouring the moment, the life that has woken up in my body. I _definitely_ have troubles breathing evenly.

He lets go of me and I stand on my bed again, but the kissing doesn’t stop. I take the opportunity and slide my hand down his belly and into his trousers. He stops, looking at me questioningly.

“You really aren’t yourself,” he murmurs.

I let out a quiet giggle.

The door suddenly creaks and my hand find its way out of his pants.

“Mr Holmes, what do you think you’re doing?!” An older nurse looks at us, disgusted.

“Getting physically intimate with the patient, I’d say,” he replies and I try to hide my chuckle.

“This is a hospital, not a dirty motel! It’s inappropriate!” she yells as she comes closer. “And you shouldn’t even be here!”

He steps back from my bed and I sit on it. The nurse flashes me a disapproving look while taking my blood pressure. Not a great timing for this particular measurement, though. He goes in circles around the room; I suppose he has something to _walk off_. The nurse writes down the result on my patient’s chart and shakes her head but leaves without a word.

But the mood is gone. Once the nurse gets out, he locks his eyes with me but I sense a different kind of tension. I guess he regrets getting carried away. I’m not saddened by this. It seems logical to me, although it really doesn’t.

I think back to the moment when he said _not sexual_. _How_ _can he love me and claim it’s not sexual?_ , the question pops into my head. Maybe I misunderstood it and he let me kiss him out of pity?

“You once said I loved you,” I speak up. “And that you loved me.”

He nods his head, standing opposite to the end of my bed.

“Yes. But we weren’t a couple,” he replies.

I frown.

“Why?”

He stares. _Unpleasantly_.

“It’s a long story.” His reply is almost hissed through his gritted teeth.

“I’ve got all the time in the universe.”

He gazes at me expressionlessly. I think he’s calculating the risk or tries to introduce the story the shortest way possible. Somehow, it _also_ seems obvious to me. He comes one step closer.

“I have a sister named Eurus. She’s highly intelligent and even more dangerous. She’s locked up in a institution built for people like her but she’d managed to turn the entire staff there to be her slaves once. She lured me, my brother Mycroft and John Watson there to execute her very cruel plan. Long story short, I had to go through a series of tests, each one of them requiring my emotional engagement. And I’m not really an affectionate person.” It sounds weird since he’s obviously very emotional. “One of my tests was you.”

I raise my eyebrows and he pauses for a minute.

“I’d been convinced that your flat was filled with explosives. Eurus said that she would blow you up if I didn’t make you say ‘I love you’.”

 _I love you_. My heartbeat races, my vision gets a little unstable. I feel a little bit dizzy.

“But you asked me to say it first. To _say it like I meant it_ -“

“Stop it.”

I’m unable to look in one direction for longer than a second. The room dances around me. I clench my fingers on the both sides of my bed. I feel sick and I’m pretty sure I’m going to vomit any minute. My breathing gets heavy.

“What’s going on?”

It feels like I’m going to faint. I lean forward and press my forehead against the mattress. _Oh, God, I’m going to throw up_ , I think in a complete panic.

 _Say it like you mean it_. The colourful sweater, the telephone, the kitchen. _I love you_. My not-so-impressive stomach content gets closer to my throat.

“I said it then,” he resumes as if nothing happened. “I said and I meant it: _I love you_.”

I have to force myself into thinking about breathing, otherwise I would be long unconscious. I struggle with the vomit and his voice, his exact voice wanders around my head.

“I tried to make amends because you’re important to me,” I hear him from over my head. “You thought you weren’t important but _you do count. You’ve always counted and I’ve always trusted you_ -“

“Get out.”

I lean over the edge of the bed, ready to get rid of my stomach content but this is not the moment. I sense his presence and therefore I raise my eyes to look at him. The view of him doesn’t make things better.

“I said: get out.”

His presence irritates me out of sudden. Every inch of his body I was touching a couple of minutes ago seems repellent to me, his voice is like the worst music possible. The scent of his cologne makes me even more sick. I look up at him, fury in my eyes again.

“I’ve choked you once before. What makes you think I’m incapable of doing it again?” I snap at him.

He flashes me an enigmatic glance and walks out of the room.

I throw up extensively and after that, I plop onto my bed, drifting away into unconsciousness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would love to read your opinions on this one! ❤️


	4. I Sing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was supposed to publish this chapter tomorrow... but tomorrow the fifth season of "Lucifer" comes out and I promised myself to avoid any social media in case of any spoilers! And this means I wouldn't be able to publish this part on Tumblr (and I do it because it started this way).
> 
> Thank you for staying with me for the entire journey. As many of you may know, it started as a oneshot, a crazy idea I had to get out of my head. I wrote the first part in, like, 20 minutes? And decided to publish it on Tumblr, convinced it won't catch anybody's attention. Funny, because the doc on my hard drive with the text is still called "Molly going crazy", the title "Screaming" was made up on the go. Imagine my astonishment once I saw all the notifications from people saying that I had to continue now, that it's "so good"! Thank you for your words. Somehow, the story built itself. Another parts were easy to create. I didn't have to look for any ideas. They came to me.
> 
> I hope I won't disappoint you with the ending.

I hear voices over the black fog of my unconsciousness but I can’t be sure they’re real. I think it’s the doctors. They try to revive me. I hear that I have a stable pulse and I breathe. Good. Or whatever.

When I open my eyes, I’m sweaty and frightened. My T-shirt is so wet it changed its colour to dark grey. My hair is sticking to my face. My eyeballs go from one side to another in an utter madness. I notice it’s already dark outside. Doctor Mike lights up a small lamp on my nightstand. I think he suspects me of being scared of darkness. I’ve never been. Now he’s right. He says comforting things, like: “You’re safe now” or “I can see you’ve been tortured”. But “torture” doesn’t even cover it. I’ve been through a vivisection. Sherlock gutted me out and now I know for sure he did it on purpose.

I fight insomnia for very long hours. When I manage to fall asleep, I hardly find any rest in it.

I toss and turn endlessly. It never gets better. The bed sheet is too hot or too cold. The dreams I have are horrifying. All the memories I’ve kept safely tamed resurface and _haunt me_. Suffocate me with their weight. They’re my burden now.

They burn me out. They wreak havoc. I feel every cell in my body ache as I remember the pain of all the words unsaid, all the moments not lived. I see the bright blue eyes, always looking through. I hear the voice. It lies to me. Does it, though? It says: _I... I love you_. And again, quieter: _I love you_. It hurts because I’m sure it’s insincere. It couldn’t be any other way. He’ll never love me like I want to be loved. He can’t give me safety and protection. He can’t support me. He can’t be with me. He can’t be with me. _He can’t be with me_.

I scream. The hot air rips my lungs into shreds. My voice is hoarse and piercing at the same time, it echoes in the entire building. I scream as though being cut in two; a primal shriek finds its way out of me. It’s the only thing that keeps me sane - otherwise the pain would be unbearable. _I want to be dead._ I scream so loud the night staff comes to my room every fifteen minutes to wake me and assure me I’m safe but it doesn’t take long for the circle to go around again. They finally give up and inject something into my arm. The dangerous mix of fear and pain is numb now. It doesn’t vanish; it’s covered with a warm fluff of the meds. It’s there. _He’ll never love me the way I want to be loved_.

My eyes are stuck on one point on the ceiling. I want to scream but I can’t.

* * *

The cold late-autumn air lashes my face when I place my foot outside the door. I wrap the scarf tighter around my neck. It’s difficult to keep yourself warm when there’s not much of the fat tissue in your body.

My therapist says it’ll get better. I don’t know. I don’t think he tries to lie to me. I choose to believe him. He also says that I’ll never fully recover. My psyche is broken beyond repair. LSD killed me and didn’t do it at all. All I can do is to try to make the best of it. “Regaining your memory was the most important part,” he said once. “And you’ve succeeded in it.” I think he hopes that there’s a chance for me to get back to my old self in that. I’ve lived with my missing memories for over six months and today is the first day I feel good enough to leave the house. I’m going to face death. Many deaths.

I walk down the London streets and the air soaks up in my lungs. It’s cold but in a pleasant way. The hot air gets out of me with carbon dioxide. I breathe in the chill _oxygenium_ with my eyes closed. I relish the moment. I never know when my brain will snap and turn everything into endless sadness. I don’t have fury attacks anymore but instead, I wake up in the middle of every night, screaming. The scream eventually turns into cry. I curl up in my bed and wait for the pain to let go. It never really does but its level decreases to the point I’m able to live with.

 _Being yourself_. What does it even mean? Whatever I do, I’m me. I’m me when I walk down the London streets, heading to work. I’m me when I jump out of my bed and choke someone. I’m me when I throw up because my body cannot contain the anxiety caused by my fugue. I’m me when I scream my head off in the middle of a night. I’m me when I kiss someone I love. I’m me when I cry because I couldn’t be more broken. I’ve learned to simply accept whatever comes to me. This is who I am. _A mess_. Fixing me is a job for a lifetime.

I’ve been missing the lab. I throw myself into work because it helps me soothe the suffering. The relief is temporary but whatever works, right? I love the sound of the glasses clinking against each other. I love how my brain focuses entirely on bringing out my scientific knowledge and it almost resembles the mind I used to have. These are the moments when I know the old Molly Hooper is still there. She didn’t die because _she always wins_.

It’s almost dark outside when I turn off the lights. I take a short look around to make sure I’ve cleaned everything up. I push the door open and fix the handbag on my shoulder. I walk out into the corridor, pale-y lightened with the cold hospital lamps. I raise my head up and freeze.

He freezes as well. He’s changed; weaker, sadder. His blue eyes widen and I can see his breathing stops. His mouth are open in an utter shock. He’s speechless but doesn’t look away. He swallows with difficulty.

“Molly.”

The soft whisper fills out the space of the corridor. I begin to get dizzy and my heart rate quickens rapidly. I take a small step back and cling to the door behind me. I’m close to hyperventilate. He makes a move towards me but I start visibly shivering in response.

“Molly...”

He’s filled with guilt which adds a fair weight to his movements. His eyes, usually cold and focused on looking through his mind palace, are mild, even glossy. His eyebrows frown in worry. I’m sure he pities me. I don’t need his pity. I slide down the door and sit on the floor with my legs pulled to my chest. I see his coat getting closer with a corner of my eye. My body trembles strongly. I let out the tears.

“Leave me alone,” I whisper.

He stands in place for a while and walks off eventually. When he’s no longer in the range of my eyesight, I curl up on the floor and cry. _He can’t be with me_.

* * *

I’m slightly cheerful on my days off. The winter is pretty ugly this year; it doesn’t look like the ones I remember. No fluffy snow and colourful lights. But maybe I’ve just gotten too old to see them? I think it’s sad. We become adults and forget all the beauty we’ve had as children. We forget that the key to happiness is not only in winning the jackpot but also in seeing the little things and enjoying them. In finding a four-leaf clover and thinking: “Today I’m going to be lucky”. In hearing your mum is going to make your favourite biscuits because she loves you so much she could do anything to see a smile on your face. I sound like _The Little Prince_ , don’t I? When your brain tries to find its way back to sanity, you happen to have a lot thoughts. _Trust me_.

I deliberately step into every grey, muddy-snowy-watery puddle and smile. My shoes will get soaked up for a while but I enjoy this childish activity until I can. I just hope my groceries won’t slip out of my shopping bag to fall into one of these snowy monsters. I think about the small but pleasant stuff: like ordering a pizza and watching a film. My brain _loves_ turning into tapioca. Well, it doesn’t, _I do_. I also bought brownies and can’t wait to stuff my stomach with them after the pizza box is empty. For a moment I think of the poor person who would have to go through my stomach content if I killed myself tonight, and then shake it off. I don’t want to die but I don’t have much of a will to live as well. I’ve learned not to joke about suicide around other people, though. It turns out death is a difficult matter for normal human beings. I wouldn’t know, I’ve always been very practical about it. It doesn’t scare me that much. Well, maybe a little because I’ve never been through this. They say I have but I don’t remember a shred from this moment. I’ve regained a memory of being strongly hit in a head in my house but then... it’s all darkness. The next thing was the hospital ceiling and the conversation The Three Horsemen of Madness had in my room.

I’ve loved watching trash telly (and not only this) because it keeps my sadness and insanity at bay. I’m well aware of that. My therapist didn’t have to tell me this but he did it anyway. He even asked if I wanted to do anything about it. I didn’t but he says (because the matter obviously wasn’t dropped) it would work out for the best because _a broken heart cannot be mended by watching stories about other hearts being healed_. I thought he was supposed to help me keep my post-LSD psyche under control but it seems I couldn’t have been more wrong. When I look back at the memories I’ve retrieved, I can’t help but think... maybe this craziness has always been with me? The way I sewed my happiness with _his_ skin, desperately, utterly, unconditionally, obsessively... Omnipresent but invisible. Courageous - with a rabbit heart. The smallest spark of hope I’ve ever seen kept me by his side. Maybe LSD only sped up what was inevitable: a nervous breakdown. Although I wasn’t really weak. My heart just popped, heavy from all the sorrow it has carried for five years.

Now, after being completely broken, I’m learning to live in a world without him. I don’t blame him - after all, it was me who asked him to leave me alone. I thought he would fight for me but I’m glad he didn’t. My insanity would feed on the scraps he would throw me, reliving the annealed wounds with a red-hot steel. He doesn’t come to Bart’s or maybe he does but he’s good at avoiding people. And sometimes, when everything seems fine and I’m home alone (which is always), I fill out the silence with singing. I choose the saddest songs I know and sing. I bet my neighbours have had to call an ambulance to save their bleeding ears at least once but I’m a psycho. I can do whatever I want because I don’t care.

I’ve recently watched _Eclipse_ and I sing a song from its soundtrack under my nose when I unlock the door. The door clicks and I enter my completely dark house. I don’t turn on the lights and enjoy the fact that it’s already dim outside but it’s too early for the street lights to turn on and shine into my kitchen. I stand in the entrance room and soak in the emptiness. It fills me out and seeps into my bones. This is where my body find its way to the state of default. I put my shopping bag away on the floor and untangle my winter shoes. After that I move the groceries into the kitchen, almost tiptoeing, as though afraid of waking someone up.

I take off my coat and scarf, putting them down on the kitchen counter. I start unloading my shopping bag, thinking about the pizza I’m going to order. I’ve gained some weight, maybe a little too much but that’s all right. I couldn’t care less about my body. If I had to worry about my appearance as well, I would definitely kill myself.

“ _My love has concrete feet, my love’s an iron ball, wrapped around your ankles, over the waterfall..._ ”

“If I didn’t know better, I would think it was on purpose.”

A glass bottle of a carrot juice slips out of my palm as I jump in a complete horror. My socks soak in the sticky liquid but I can barely seem bothered by this. I turn on the heel and look at the utter darkness in my living room. The same moment the street lights turn on and a beam of weak light falls on his face as well. I feel my body trembling. I want to back out but there is no escape - he could catch me any time. Not that he would but the fear takes over my mind.

“You... you broke into my house?” I ask, panting. A panic attack is around the corner.

“I entered your house without your knowledge,” he replies, utterly steady. “There’s a difference-“

“What are you doing here?” I put on a tough act but we both know it’s a ruse. I don’t care. I don’t want him to break me again. I might never recover.

“I came to see you.”

I scoff.

“You could do it the normal way.”

“Would you meet me, then?”

“No.”

“Exactly.”

I’m pressed against the refrigerator and I feel a pain in my back as the metallic door resists to my spinal bones. He makes three steps forward. He takes off his gloves and shoves them into his coat pockets. He takes if off as well, with no rush, and throws it away on my couch. Without unlocking our eyes, he approaches me. I’m sure I’ll tip over the refrigerator in a second because he’s so close there can’t be more than a foot between us. He stops. My head is dizzy and I feel like throwing up but then he squats and begins to collect the shreds of glass bottle from the floor. I’m sweaty but relieved. The tension leaves my body and I exhale loudly.

It catches his attention. He looks up at me.

“I’m not here to hurt you.”

I scoff again.

“It doesn’t matter.”

I turn around to face the kitchen counter and find paper towels but they’re on the opposite side. I glare down and see that the juice is everywhere but my socks are completely soaked up, so it wouldn’t be smart of me to walk off to the bathroom for a mop. Besides, I could step into the cracks and that was not the point of his help.

He finishes and throws the glass away. He remembers very well where my bin is. After that, he wordlessly goes to my bedroom and comes back with a pair of dry socks. I can see that he spread a bit of the juice on the floor but his gesture successfully disables my frustration. He sticks out his arms towards me. I hesitate. What is he planning to do? I slowly reach out to his arms but he slides them under my armpits and lifts me up over the juice, placing me on my small kitchen island. Then he disappears in the bathroom and comes back with the mop. He wipes out the floor. Not a word slips out of his lips.

I slowly take off my wet socks, watching his every move. I put the dirty socks away next to me and reach out for the paper towel. I dry my feet out while Sherlock cleans up my kitchen floor. Even my old self would say that only a lunatic would find it possible. Cheers to all of us, crazies. I put away the used paper towel as well and put on my new socks. I start to swing my legs a little bit as Sherlock finishes the cleanup. He walks off to the bathroom to rinse off the mop for the last time and comes back to me. I can’t look away somehow.

“Thank you,” I say in a hoarse voice. I clear my throat.

“I’m sorry,” he replies. “I didn’t mean to frighten you, nor be an intruder.”

I shrug.

“It was just a carrot juice. I’ll drink more water, then.”

My legs swing more and more intensively. I know what it means and so does he, so I force myself to stop because a smirk crawls up on his face. I feel my cheeks burning up and I instantly regret tangling my hair into a pony tail. This is probably the most normal thing that happened to me in about nine months.

He places his hand next to my left thigh and leans on. I feel his perfume and something in me shivers. My heart rate goes wild but I cannot force myself to look away. He puts his palm really gently on my right cheek and his face is so close I can see every pore on his skin. I give in and let out a quiet exhale. I close my eyes and my body is fulfilled with warmth as his lips lock with mine. He moves a little to stand fully in front of me and takes my face in both of his hands. His lips open more and more eagerly as he doesn’t see any objection on my side. My legs clench around his waist, I throw my arms around his neck. I pull him closer but it’s difficult to say whether I’m motivated by the kiss or the simple need of a hug.

I feel awaken. My body’s warm, pulsing with every beat my heart does. For the first time in many months I feel alive and I relish this moment because I know that in a minute, everything will end.

And it does.

I push him away a little too hard. He has to take a step back to prevent a fall. The passionate fire turns into anger.

“Don’t do it.”

I feel a twinge in my chest seeing pain in his eyes. He looks as if I just crushed his last hope. His blue eyes are tired, miss their old spark. I hate myself for pushing him away and feeling the way I feel.

“Why?” he asks.

“Because it doesn’t make sense,” I hiss through my teeth.

“What doesn’t?”

“Us.”

He winces and shifts nervously.

“What?”

I clench my palm into a fist and press it against my forehead, leaned forward. A forgotten suffering comes back to me. I’ve buried it so deep inside I was certain it was gone but it’s been waiting for me. A battle I didn’t want to fight starts right here and right now. And I, again, want to be dead and dead only. I close my eyes so tightly it almost hurts as does every cell in my body.

“We don’t make sense,” I utter after anticipating a less painful moment.

He starts breathing quicker. He’s as lost as he’s never been before. I imagine that’s how he looked like calling me to save me. Helpless in the face of the truth.

“How could you have fallen in love with me, then? ” he asks, hopelessness taking over him. “Despite all the pain I’ve caused you, all the things I’ve said...”

“I suppose love _is_ a kind of madness,” I say, my unseeing eyes focused on one irrelevant point.

“Your love is illogical, since I’ve always been an utter cock.”

“Not always,” I reply, smirking weakly. “But we don’t love for the logical reasons. We love despite all the illogical ones.”

We fall silent. I enjoy my most sane moment for several minutes. It can disappear anytime.

“I love you.”

I raise my head up. It feels like my heart skips a beat.

His eyes gaze at me with pain I’ve never seen on his face. He almost pants, his arms are unfolded. He’s like a living target. He’s just showed me where to shoot and I stretch my bow, aiming for his chest.

“But you cannot give me the love I want,” I reply, my voice stifled. I finally sigh in exasperation. “We’re far two different. It would be a disaster of a relationship. Can you imagine yourself cleaning our flat every Saturday, planning our wedding, putting our children to sleep? Because this is want I want. But it would only hurt us more.”

“I can change,” he says.

I scoff.

“And that’s the point,” I respond. “I don’t want you to change. I love you the way you are. I love every part of you. But you cannot love me. You couldn’t have loved me before and you can’t do it now.”

“I think I’ve loved you long before,” he says in a weak voice.

_I am... sorry. Forgive me._

_You can see me._

_You do count._

_I’ve always trusted you._

_Thank you._

_The one person who mattered the most._

_I hope you’ll be very happy, Molly Hooper._

_You look well._

_I’m worried about you, Molly._

_I love you._

I gaze at him almost breathless. I blink and make myself utter a response:

“I love you, too,” I whisper. My eyes fill with tears. “But you cannot make me happy... _Sherlock_.”

His name tastes sweet in my mouth. I’ve missed saying it. Now I glance at his lips and think about the moments we shared a few minutes ago and back then in the hospital. I could share them with him forever. I would never get bored of him. But there would be times when he would forget about my presence in our flat, when he wouldn’t listen to me, chasing a lead. When he would be lost and I couldn’t find him.

And now... me with my mood swings and moments of insanity striking when the least expected. With my broken mind. Unfixable. Fucked up.

He suffers and this time, I’m the one to blame. I’ve broken the unbreakable man.

“I’ve turned you into something you’ve always hated,” I say. “You’re weak, you’re an easy target. You’re emotional and vulnerable.”

“As I’ve always been,” he replies. “You’re my strength.”

I wince.

“Strength? Sherlock-“

“You’re my strength because you’ve helped me understand myself better than anyone. I’ve never had to pretend with you. And... and back then in Sherrinford, when I realised how much pain I’ve caused you... no one ever has made me realise so much of me with so little words as you have. You are the reflection of my sensitivity. With you, I’m no longer myself.”

He begins to slowly get closer.

“But... But this is my point!” I protest. “It’s not a good thing becau-“

“It is a good thing because... what does it really mean - _being myself_?” He stops at less than a foot from me and scoffs. “I am myself in every minute of my life. I won’t miss my old self, though. I was a completely blind moron, who couldn’t appreciate people around him. And you’ve managed to look behind this curtain and see the man I am now. You’ve taught me to be who I am now.”

He smiles, lifting only one corner of his lips but he knows. I try to back out and escape his look but I feel that I don’t want to. My body is slowly giving in. It is so _warm_. It feels so _good_. I love him _so much_.

“But the old Molly may be no longer there. I’m a mess now,” I mumble, trying to avoid his gaze.

He cups my face in his palms again and places our foreheads together. I can’t resist. I don’t want to resist. I lose control over my head and I’m not even worried. A pleasant wave of chemicals floods my body and they’re better than any of the antipsychotics I’ve taken in the past nine months. I’m still a mess. I know that Sherlock will regret his decision one day when a switch in my brain goes off and I’ll stand at a rooftop (flashbacks will kill him, though). But I’m tired of trying to be normal.

“So am I. When I found out that Eurus had attacked you... I was both furious and hurt. I was torn. I still feel guilty over the fact that I couldn’t have prevented this and that she could have killed you. I was ready to bring hell on Earth. Maybe you’re a mess... but you’re also somehow a piece of puzzle that’s missing from my messy life.”

I feel the warmth of his breath on my face, the softness of his hands on my cheeks. His curls tickle my eyelids. I so _weak_.

“Oh, come on,” he whispers, “just give in already.”

I giggle and lose myself completely. I want to scream... but everything I do speaks louder than words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that's it! I hope it didn't look weird. I mean... look at the ending. Making it unhappy was tempting... but my heart won, I guess. 
> 
> Tell me what you think of it. Tell me everything. I can't wait to see your feedback because I love it. Every comment means a world to me. Love you, Sherlollians! (And those, who aren't shippers but still enjoy my "writing").


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